Windows 8.1 Laptop - OK To Keep User Files On External USB Drive?
Sep 15, 2014
I plan to get a new Windows 8.1 laptop soon. I want it to have 8gb RAM and an internal 128gb SSD drive where I keep all the OS, driver and other system files. Then I want all my media files (documents, music, vids, etc) on an external USB 3.0 hard drive. I recognize that keeping files on an external drive may cause slow behavior in some situations. My my guess is that USB 3.0 is fast enough so this won't be a problem in most situations. And I plan to get an external drive that has USB 3.0.
I'm not a power user. I don't edit video or do fancy rendering or stuff like that. I just browse the net, create some docs and spreadsheets, listen to some music and watch some vids. I play around with Audacity once in a while and that's about it. I'm an average user.
So, any problems with keeping all my user files on an external drive?
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Oct 9, 2014
I was downloading files from an external drive that iI had used as a back up for windows vista. Now where they landed in my windows 8.1 computer and if they were only photos, music and videos. I'm having a hard time with windows 8. How do I locate the downloads. I thought of doing a system restore but I would rather locate those files.
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Sep 20, 2014
I had a windows 7 laptop which finally died but before it did a made a system image backup to my external hard drive so I have all the files. How do I load that onto my new windows 8.1 laptop so I have all my files there?
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Mar 23, 2013
I was working on a windows 8 laptop and wanted to transfer user files to the new laptop. I pulled the drive from the Windows 8 laptop, plugged it into an open sata port on my windows 7 bench machine (which already contained the files to be transferred) and booted without problem. I assigned the windows 8 drive a letter and opened the drive. All the files of the Windows 8 drive were visible. I opened a directory off of the root, created a new directory and copied the files. No problem. I opened some of the image files and all looked well. I shut down the win7 box, pulled the Windows 8 drive and put it back in the laptop and it booted, no problem.
When I went looking for the files, they were no where to be found! Win 8 showed the "used space" as if the copy never happened. Thinking I made an error on the copy I shut down the Windows 8 laptop and pulled the drive, plugged it back into the win7 box and booted. The win7 boot detected "file corruption" on the volume in question and did some "orphan" recovering and a bunch of other stuff. When it finally finished and booted all the files copied were in a "found.000" directory. I took ownership and repeated. Funny thing is that while the win7 showed the drive with the expected 40gb of data taking up space, the windows 8 showed the "used space" as if the data wasnt even there? why as I try to copy the files from the win7 drive converted to a usb external directly into the Windows 8 laptop.
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Jul 24, 2014
My old Sony Vaio broke the other day, so I've just got a new laptop. The Vaio was Vista, but now I'm on Windows 8.
I'd been backing up my Vaio to an external harddrive, but all I ever did was run the backup and let it get on with it. So for example, within the external harddrive now it just has a list of the dates I ran a backup, followed by 'Backup files 1', 'Backup files 2' etc. I'm hoping these include some of the documents/files I had on there, but I can't be sure. What exactly will have been backed up here?
I've been trying now to restore these files on my new laptop, but I can't seem to find a way. Is it possible?
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Apr 10, 2013
I was trying to locate some files in my user folders in Windows 8 I was looking for the app data files to restore my email from an old version to a new clean install of the client. I could not find the folder although I knew it existed as this is where the app is storing my email, so I figured it was hidden. I started to look for the setting I knew in 7 that would allow you to see hidden files when you ran the folder properties. The only thing I saw anywhere about hidden files was on the first page of the properties where it says read only and hidden so I checked the box and told it to apply. (I know, stupid thing to do since I did not understand what it was doing. This is so unlike me) Now I do not have any user folders and not much works. How can I restore my user files?
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Jan 4, 2014
My Seagate Portable Drive seems to work as the green light comes on.
Screen shot of my Disk Management below. Am I missing something?
Other solutions have been to right click and assign a drive, but those listed below other that the C: don't allow.
Using OS Windows 8.1
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Jan 14, 2013
I have an Acer laptop with Windows 8 pre-installed. It has an USB3 socket. When I plug an external drive into it the drive appears in the device manager but not in "my computer".
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May 31, 2014
I'm trying to recover lost partition and files from external USB hard drive (Maxtor Portable 250GB). I'm using disk Internals sofitware and the software finds the files, but when I try to save them on the drive, each time I get a watchdog, or another BOSD error.
Here are the dumps.SF_31-05-2014.zip
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Aug 31, 2013
Is it possible to move the User and Program Files Folder from the drive with Windows 8 in it to another drive?
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Apr 8, 2014
like everyone else my tiles are missing but for some reason I am under temp user. I'm looking apps there's only a few. I can click on computer, users: to select files from the main user but I cannot sign in as that user. When I click on users it only shows administrator and activate guests. This happened two weeks ago
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Dec 26, 2012
I have a 2TB Western Digital My Book Essentials, it's filled with tons of old photos, movies, docs, games, and I'm scared to think of what else. The SATA to USB connector broke on it, so I took the drive apart and put it inside my computer. I opened up device manager because it wasn't showing up automatically and the 2TB is showing up as unallocated, I'm freaking out now because I'm scared the data was somehow deleted.What do I do?
edit: I realize also this isn't directly related to Windows 8 (besides the fact it's the OS I'm on), but I don't know where else to post it. I'd also like to say that I had a really deep feeling the drive was going to break continually for about two weeks before it happened, so if you have a similar feeling about something, don't ignore it!
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Feb 24, 2014
When I install stuff like the Microsoft .NET Framework, and other things, I noticed a folder being temporarily created on my External HDD 2 TB . I guess since it's the largest partition with the largest free space Windows is using it for temp downloads or extraction of MSI / EXE files.
How can I disable Windows from touching that drive? it is very slow I want all temp stuff copied on my SSD
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May 16, 2013
A few months ago my laptop broke and it needed repairs. The HDD was replaced and i got my laptop back with one new HDD inside and one "broke" HDD in a bag. Later the "Repaired" Laptop crashed again so i bought a new one and took the HDD out of the old laptop. I bought a HDD case with USB connection and both of the HDD's where intact. The oldest HDD contained windows 7 and the replaced contained windows 8. Now i want to sell the Windows 8 HDD so i want it to be clean of personal files but i want it to keep windows 8. I thought the solution was to run the windows 8 on the HDD so i can use the program deletation program of that windows 8. The problem is i dont know how to run windows 8 of a hard drive. I have searched the internet but with no success.
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Aug 23, 2014
My wife just got a new PC running Windows 8.1 Pro and she wants to re-connect her external hard drive that has all her game files on it to the new PC.
While the new PC recognizes the drive it states that it needs to be initialized , doing so would wipe the data currently on the drive which would be unacceptable. How to get the new PC to recognize this drive and its data?
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Apr 12, 2013
I successfully managed to create a virtual hard drive on my external drive to try boot windows 8 off it. I managed to boot it up and the login screen also appears as normal. I have a successful login, But on the second time login I am faced with black screen and the cursor. I'm aware that Microsoft has released a fix for this. I have attached the executable in the zip. I tried running this fix but it didn't work . After the black screen appears, even in safe mode I cannot run explorer.exe or open any folder to try running any executable files
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Apr 2, 2013
I have bought a 2TB western Digital external USB3 hard drive and installed the Asmedia drivers but windows never picks it up. See the screen capture. The drivers are the ASMedia USB 3 host controller but it seems to show up after a few seconds as USB Root Hub (xHCI) with a triangle. I have tried updating from there and directing it to the drivers and uninstalling and then reinstalling and the drive shows up long enough to copy but then disappears again.
I literally have run out of options.
It seems to be a common theme on the web and especially with Western Diital drives although I think it is windows struggling to recognise them and implement correctly.
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Apr 26, 2014
Just replaced my OS (Win 8.1) Drive, and was planning on using the old drive as a back up.
This new (and old) drive have just the OS, all my programs and media etc are on other drives.
Can I put my old OS drive, with Windows 8.1 still installed, into a USB Docking Station, and use it as a back up boot drive. In other words will this drive boot from the Docking Station if I keep it up to date (Copy Disk regularly) in case of internal hard drive failure?
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Sep 15, 2013
HP Envy dv7, Windows 8
Seagate 2TB drive mounted in a Thermaltake, Max 5 enclosure. The drive does not show in Windows 8. Does show when running Disk Management (diskmgmt.msc) but shows as "Unallocated" without a drive letter. If run the Seagate drive tools, it shows up as unallocated, with drive letter "C". But there is obviously already a drive "C".
Disk Management does not present a means by which to assign a drive letter
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Mar 16, 2013
I'm currently using a Dell Inspiron 3520 laptop with Windows 8 on it. I have an external hard drive from a Windows 7 desktop. It recognizes the external hdd right away and I can access it but I can't figure out how to boot Windows 7 as the primary. I've tried changing boot order in bios but I've had no luck as it still boots Windows 8 first. Is there a way to use the Windows 7 as the primary drive ? Even a way to temporarly turn off the Windows 8 hard drive will work. I just need to access the Windows 7 hard drive without having to navigate through program files to have to open something.
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Oct 14, 2013
I am having problems with system imaging my Windows 8 machine to an external hardrive via a usb (??) cable.
First, as mentioned in another thread is the exceptionally long time. The external drive is a WD 1TB BTW. I have two older hardrives on the computer. Just installed the second, which at this time is not being used. Trying several several programs, Paragon Free, Easeus, Macrium Reflect and the built in Windows Backup I was getting 14 hour estimates.
The actual issue I wish to resolve is that during a over 9 hour backup of the primary drive with approx. 34GBs, I noted what appears to be a folder with the Windows backup icon called the name of my computer on my external drive. It contains approximately 3GBs of data in multiple folders. Windows backup is turned off. I did not have this file on the external hardrive and I didn't initiate the OS to perform this. It showed no indication of running and occurred during the Macrium backup.
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Apr 2, 2013
Can i install windows 7 or 8 to an external hard drive so i can take it to another computer, select it from the boot menu and it will boot up?
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Jun 23, 2012
I installed Windows 8 today on my machine. Everything works perfectly, I'm still playing with some options and trying to figure out what's what and what's where etc, but at the moment I'm struggling with only one thing. I can't seem to get my files (music, movies etc) from external hard drive to show in metro (music, photos, videos etc). I installed windows 8 on a separate partition on my iMac 21.5" just to play with this new OS. I have my music, movies, photos saved on my main hard drive (Macintosh HD) so I thought it won't be a problem to "link" (add) it to libraries in windows (and it wasn't a problem, I added all of my folders in libraries without any issues). But I can't seem to see those files through metro UI.
And I can't play those files trough default applications (example, through photos, videos all part of metro ui, but if I choose to view those files with windows photo viewer, or windows media player I have no problems what so ever). If I copy some of those files to "local" folders (ie to My music or My Pictures) metro picks it up without any problems, those files become visible through metro. But I don't want to copy all of my photos, music and videos to those windows libraries, there must be a way for me to add them so they become visible in metro.
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Nov 26, 2013
Running Windows 8.1 and File History was working OK for my computer, actually on two different computers worked just fine. (I never could get File History to work with Windows 8). Then suddenly this feature just up an quit. Got a little "red" flag in the Action Center. Using the control panel an "setting" up File History my system says that file history is turned off. I never did turn it off, it seems it just up an turned itself off.
But here is the thing, I select my external drive to use for file history and the system says the service can not be started because its disabled or no enabled devices are associated. It "sees" the drive but will not enabled this drive. I have used various windows programs, such as system services..to "turn" on file history. But there seems not to be anything that will fix file history.
It seems all the support is non specific to file history not working. I have yet to see a simple fix to "make" Windows 8.1 to again run file history. I would just like to point and click to backup the computer...but windows is now becoming NON-USER friendly to manage these types of things.
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Apr 20, 2013
I recently purchased a WD 1TB external portable hard drive.When I first got it it was immediately recognised by my laptop (a 2 day old Asus Ultrabook S400C). This is my first time with Windows 8 so I am still learning to navigate it.
The first thing I did was transfer 650gb of movies and music across. I didn't format the hard drive first, maybe that was my first mistake. My files were still recognisable on my laptop and my WD TV Live media centre. The next day all of a sudden my media player wouldn't recognise it and when I plugged it back into my laptop it also cannot see it.
The device can be seen in device manager (when I click on properties it says it's working corectly), but not in the drives list in my computer. It is showing as "Disc 2" 'Not Iniitialised' and when I click on 'Initialise' and choose 'MBR' and hit OK it comes up with this error msg: 'The request could not be performed due to an I/O device error'.
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Aug 19, 2013
So recently had my old Windows 7 desktop crash on me. Got a new Windows 8 desktop and since then have gotten an external enclosure to try and scrap the files off of the old hard drive, but when trying to connect the Drive into the new computer I get this issue >>
406da2a65a966887ab9d90c8eaf63677.png >> cfe542bf267bd7d2e3d07b5d317c97f4.png I have tried many troubleshooting options and everytime I try to change permission I just get this error message. a66c2f145769b4fdc1c99b4efc8356a4.png >> b95f4478b90c4265e3eba041043caf3a.png
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Jan 2, 2013
I am trying to copy files from my cpu using win 7 to a friends using win 8. hd shows up with the volume used but files are not viewable. tried to copy and past to a new folder saw all the music files as they were pasteing . after I opened the new folder some files were there about 2gig out of 414.
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Mar 25, 2013
I am running Windows 8 Pro, with two USB external drives attached. One drive is "dormant", and the other is used for file backups. I have noticed that when the computer exits from sleep mode, either one or both external USB drive folders will open on the desktop. I can only guess this signifies that these drives may have been accessed while the computer was in sleep mode.
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Jul 27, 2013
So when I was installing Windows 8 Pro (which came as an upgrade from a previous version of Windows) I created an account. Let's call it "DC". During the upgrade Windows used up quite a lot of space for that account: about 25 GB.
Now when Windows 8 is installed I went into the Control Panel / Users and removed the "DC" account. I also made sure to check the box to remove all of its files.
But when I go the "C:UsersDC" folder on the hard drive, I see that the DC files are still there:
If I do it's properties it shows that it still takes 25 GB of space, that I want to reclaim. (I have a 256 GB SSD, so as you see I can't waste that much space!)
So I log in as a built-in administrator and try to delete those files (by deleting the "C:UsersDC" folder in Windows Explorer.) After a quick investigation it turns out that the most of the space is used up by the "Windows.old" file. But no matter what I do, it always results in this window:
I tried booting in a safe mode and it still gave me the same error. How to remove that "C:UsersDC" folder?
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Feb 24, 2013
I created restore disks for my new laptop. It gave me the option of using a USB drive, but I chose the option to create DVD disks instead. This went fine up until disk 6. I was able to finish, but the system has a problem reading the 6th disk. I cannot recreate the disks because HP, for some reason, made it so you can only do this once. I want to recreate the image on an external USB drive. Is there any way around this? HP will sell me a recovery set, but apparently only on disks.
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Sep 15, 2014
I purchased a Seagate 1Tb external drive that came with "Seagate Dashboard" software to manage back-ups. What I would like to do is create 2 500Gb partitions and use my Acronis software to make mirror images of both my desktop and laptop. Is this do-able? Would it be advisable to delete the "Seagate Dashboard"?
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